Leviticus chapter 16, specifies the tenth of Tishrei as the date on which the high priest shall conduct a special ceremony to purge defilement from the shrine and from the people.  The heart of the ritual is that the high priest shall bring a bull and two goats as a special offering.  First, the bull is sacrificed to purge the shrine from any defilements caused by misdeeds of the priest himself and of his household (Lev. 16:6).  Secondly, one of the goats is chosen by lot to be sacrificed to purge the shrine of any similar defilement caused by misdeeds of the whole Israelite people (Lev. 16:7-8).  Finally, the second goat is sent away, not sacrificed, to cleanse the people themselves.  The goat is marked for Azazel (scapegoat) and is sent away to wander in the wilderness (Lev. 16:10).  Before the goat is sent out, the high priest lays both his hands upon it’s head and confesses over it all the iniquities and transgressions of the Israelites, whatever their misdeeds, and so putting them on the head of the goat.  As stated in a portion of Lev. 16:20-22, “The goat shall carry on it all their iniquities to an inaccessible region...”

 The Hebrew word for scapegoat is azazel.  Azazel was seen as a type of satan in the intertestamental Book of Enoch (8:1).  The sins of the people and thus the punishment of the people were laid upon azazel, the scapegoat.  He would bear the sins of the people and the punishment of the people would be upon him.  Azazel being sent into the wilderness is understood to be a picture of satan being cast into the lake of fire (Rev. 19:20).

 In Lev. 16:8,  (read this verse) the first lot said, “La Adonai” (to the Lord).  The second lot said “La Azazel” (to the scapegoat).  The high priest took the two golden lots, one marked La Adonai and the other marked La Azazel, and placed one upon the head of each animal, sealing their fate.  It was considered a good omen if the lot marked La Adonai was drawn by the priest in the right hand, but for 40 years prior to the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. the lot for La Adonai was drawn by the priest in the left hand (Talmud, Yoma 39a).  In any event, the sins of the people were laid upon the scapegoat (Lev. 16:21-22).  Except for the 40 years prior to the destruction of the second temple, the lot La Adonai came out on the right hand of the priest and the lot La Azazel came out on the left hand of the priest.

 Messianic Understanding.  God gave this ceremony of the casting of lots during Yom Kippur to teach us how He will judge the nations of the world prior to the Messianic age known as the Millennium.  The nations of the world will be judged according to how they treated the Jewish people.  Those nations who mistreated the Jews will be goat nations and they will go into the left hand.  Those nations that stood beside the Jewish people will be sheep nations and will enter into the Messianic Kingdom or the Millennium (Matt. 25:31-46).

 Jesus during His first coming was a type of the goat marked La Adonai.  Jesus was a sin offering to us as God laid upon Him the sins of the whole world (Isa. 53:1-6; 1 Cor. 15:3; Ga. 1:3-4; Heb. 2:17; 1 John 2:2; 4:10).

 In the ceremony of the two goats, the two goats were considered as one offering. A crimson sash was tied around the horns of the goat marked azazel.  At the appropriate time, the goat was led t a steep cliff in the wilderness and shoved off the cliff.  In connection with this ceremony, and interesting tradition arose that is mentioned in the Mishnah.  A portion of the crimson sash was attached to the door of the temple before the goat was sent into the wilderness.  The sash would turn from red to white as the goat met it’s end, signaling to the people that God had accepted their sacrifices and their sins were forgiven.  This was based on Isa. 1:18.  The Mishnah tells us that 40 years before the destruction of the temple, the sash stopped turning white.  This was when Jesus was crucified.

 According to the Talmud, the destruction of the Temple did not come as a total surprise to the Jewish people.  In fact, the Talmud records that four ominous events occurred approximately forty years before the destruction of the Temple.  Those four events were to warn the rabbis of the Temple’s impending doom.  According to Jewish tradition, all four of these signs came to pass.  The four signs were:

1.  The lot for the Lord’s goat did not come up in the right hand of the high priest.

2.  The scarlet cord tied to the door of the Temple on the Day of Atonement stopped turning white after the scapegoat had been cast over the precipice.

3.  The westernmost light on the Temple candelabra would not burn.  It is believed that this light was used to light the other lights of the candelabra.

4.  The Temple doors would open by themselves.  The rabbis saw this as an ominous fulfillment of Zechariah 11:1, “Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that fire may devour thy cedars.”  The opening of the doors to let in the consuming fire foretold the destruction of the Temple itself by fire.

 The sages drew two conclusions from these warnings.  First, they realized that the destruction of the Temple was God’s judgement on the Jewish people for ungodliness. Second, they perceived the warnings as God’s way of giving them time to prepare for the restructuring of Judaism around the synagogue.

 To get back to the ceremony; in order to enter the Holy of Holies, the high priest was first to bathe his entire body, going beyond the mere washing of hands and feet as required by other occasions.  The washing symbolized his desire for purification (Num. 19).

 Messianic Understanding.  Jesus is the High Priest of God (Heb. 3:1).  In John 20:17, Jesus said, “Touch Me not; for I am not yet ascended to My Father...”  These were the same words that the priest spoke before he ascended the altar.  Jesus can be seen as Priest by looking at some other Scriptures.  In Num. 19:11, if you touched a dead body, you were unclean for seven days.  After being unclean, purification took place on the eighth day.  This is the meaning behind what happened in John 20:24-27.

 Rather than wearing his usual robe and colorful garments (described in Ex. 28 and Lev. 8:1-8), Aaron was commanded to wear special garments of linen (Lev. 16:4).  Jesus was seen wearing the same thing in Rev. 1:13-15.  Daniel also saw this and described it in Dan. 10:5-6).

 By slaying the animals at the altar and applying their blood to the altar, the garment of the high priest became very bloody and God instructed them to be washed (Lev. 6:27).  However, on Yom Kippur God declared in Isa. 1:18, “...though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow...”  Spiritually speaking, a white garment represents purity and absence of sin (Rev. 7:9,13-14; 19:8).

FACE TO FACE

 The high priest could only go into the Holy of Holies once a year (Lev. 16:2; Heb. 9:6-7).  God issued a warning that no man could see His face and live (Ex. 33:20).  but because on the Day of Atonement the priest could be in God’s presence (Lev. 16:2), another term for the Day of Atonement is “face to face.”

 By the time of the second temple, this ritual had been somewhat elaborate, and one crucial element had been added to it.  That element was that on three separate occasions the high priest appeared before the people, and three times he recited a formula of confession in their hearing.  The first confession was on the account of his own sins and those of his household; the second, on the account of the priestly tribe of Levi; the third, on the account of the whole people.

 On this occasion only, in the entire year, the confession included the priest’s saying aloud the name of God embodied in the Hebrew letters YHVH.  This was the name that God gave and explained to Moses at the burning bush, the name that was a kind of distillation of “I am Becoming who I am Becoming,” the name that was not a name in the sense of a label by which God could be called and controlled, and therefore the name that could not be said aloud.  Only on Yom Kippur was the name said aloud, in all its original awesomeness.

 In each confession, when the high priest reached the recitation of the name, the whole people would prostrate themselves and say, “Blessed be the Name of the radiance of the Kingship, forever and beyond.”  On the third recitation, the one for their own sins, they knew that the high priest had just before - on this one occasion in all the year - entered the Holy of Holies, the inmost room of the temple where god’s Presence was most fully felt.  He entered it three times, and only then came out to confess on behalf of all the people and put their sins upon the head of the goat for azazel.

 The result of this triple entry into the Holy of Holies, this triple recitation of God’s most holy name, and this triple prostration by the entire people, was an awesome sense of God’s Presence making atonement for the people, cleansing them of all their sins, permitting them to begin the year afresh, renewing their lives.  So total was this sense of transformation that, after it, the mood of the people shifted from solemn awe to joyful celebration.  The young, unmarried men and women went to dance in the fields and to choose spouses for themselves.  Yom Kippur and the fifteenth of Av were the only days in the year when this kind of mass public espousal would take place.

 “Face to face” is an idiom for Yom Kippur.  Why?  It was on Yom Kippur that the high priest had to go behind the veil of the temple.  At that moment, the nation had to hold its breath because the nation’s fate depended on God’s accepting the sacrifice.  At that point, the high priest was “face to face” with the mercy seat of God.”

THE DAY

 Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, comes on the tenth day of the Jewish month of Tishrei (September/October).  It is the last day of the Ten Days of Repentance, and it is the most solemn day of the Jewish calendar.  It is believed that those who have not been good enough to be written in the Book of Life immediately on Rosh HaShanah are given ten days to repent, pray for forgiveness, and do good deeds until Yom Kippur, when their fate will be decided.  The entire Day of Forgiveness (Yom Kippur) is spent fasting and praying.  Because this day is the most solemn day in the year, it is known as “The Day.”

THE FAST

 Fasting is one of the most important of the commandments leading to atonement. The Torah says three times; “And this shall be to you a law for all times:  In this seventh month, on the tenth day of the month you shall practice self-denial” (Lev. 16:29; 23:27; Num. 29:7); tradition (the Jewish understanding) interprets self-denial as fasting.  For this reason Yom Kippur is known as “The Fast Day.”

THE GREAT SHOFAR

 As mentioned before, there are three primary shofarim (trumpets) to the Jewish people and these three trumpets are associated with specific days in the year.  These three trumpets are:  (a) “The First Trump” blown and associated with Pentecost; (b) “The Last Trump,” blown and associated with Rosh HaShanah; (c) “The Great Trump,” blown and associated with Yom Kippur.  It is on Yom Kippur when the Great Trumpet, known in Hebrew as the Shofar HaGadol is blown.  This is refered to in Isa. 27:13 and Matt. 24:31.

NEILAH:  THE CLOSING OF THE GATES OF HEAVEN

 Neilah is the closing or final service of Yom Kippur.  It is the Jewish belief that the gates of Heaven are opening during the days of repentance to receive our prayers for forgiveness and that they close after the neilah service.  (Specifically, they are open on Rosh HaShanah to let the righteous into Heaven and remain open until the neilah service of Yom Kippur.  When the final blast of the shofar (the Great Trumpet) is heard at the end of the neilah service, those who have observed the day with sincerity should feel that they have been inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life.

 Spiritual Understanding.  The Day of Atonement was the most solemn of all the feast days.  It was the day of cleansing for the nation and for the sanctuary.  On this day alone, once a year, the high priest entered into the holiest of all, the Holy of Holies in the Temple, with the blood of the Lord’s goat, the sin offering.  Here he sprinkled the blood on the mercy seat.  The blood of the sin offering on the great Day of Atonement brought about the cleansing of all sin for the priesthood, the sanctuary, and Israel as a nation (Lev. 16:29-34). (cont'd on next page)